What is The Strokes’ most popular song to perform live?
New York garage rock revivalists The Strokes changed the landscape of alternative music when they made their grand arrival at the turn of the century with their debut album Is This It. The LP had a grand cultural impact, which has become an ever-increasingly rare feat for a band, and to this day, tracks from the record continue to dominate their set lists.
Is This It remains the most popular album in their repertoire, and the tracklist reads like a greatest hits collection, filled with anthems that soundtracked a generation. The Strokes unknowingly tapped into the zeitgeist, and within a year, they’d risen from obscurity to become the most-talked-about new band on the planet.
Their debut album is more than another record; it’s stacked with tracks of immense nostalgia for many who grew up worshipping Is This It. While The Strokes have made five more records, none are as widely adored as their first offering, which successfully defined a whole period of time and continues to strike a chord with younger audiences.
Unsurprisingly, considering they are the oldest set of songs by the band, the five most-played tracks by The Strokes are all featured on Is This It. These creations have been with them since the beginning of their journey and have all been played on over 400 occasions as The Strokes rose from playing clubs to mammoth arenas.
Although ‘Last Nite’ is the most widely known song by The Strokes, it’s only the second most-played effort in their back catalogue. Frontman Julian Casablancas reflected on the song in 2020, revealing he was no longer interested in performing the hit single but does anyway because of the public’s appetite to hear it.
Casablancas told The Times: “We hadn’t played for a while, so it was still fun, but when you start playing 30 or 40 shows, the music doesn’t move you. You feel phoney. To some extent, that’s why I play with Voidz. I couldn’t care less about playing ‘Last Nite.'”
The frontman added: “Really, it’s similar to listening to a song. I get sick of songs quickly. Even Beethoven’s ‘Moonlight Sonata.’ You listen to that enough, you will get sick of it.”
Although Casablancas grows tired of playing ‘Last Nite’ while on the road, it’s an immovable part of their performance, and they’ve only played ‘Someday’ on more occasions. The Is This It cut is a personal favourite of guitarist Albert Hammond Jr, who believes it has aged better than anything else in their back catalogue. He once remarked: “I love ‘Reptilia’. I think it’ll always be fun. I don’t think it’ll ever age as well as ‘Someday’.”
According to drummer Fabrizio Moretti, his first exposure to ‘Someday’ came after “a night of debauchery” at Cabablancas’ house, where he was awoken to the sound of the frontman figuring the song out in the bathroom. He instantly knew it was “really awesome”, but he couldn’t have foreseen how beloved it would later become.
Watch footage below of The Strokes performing ‘Someday’ live at Lollapalooza Brazil in 2017 below.
